Velour
by Vena Grey
Summary: Because that's exactly what he was to her.


**Velour  
**_An Inuyasha fiction by Vena Grey_

Disclaimer: No, I am not the genius behind Inuyasha.

Summary: Because that's exactly what he was to her.

I have absolutely no idea where this came from—almost literally so, in fact. I wrote this years ago and found it in my files this morning while my fiancé was engrossed in his latest literary find. It was a nice memory; I haven't been involved in Fanfiction much recently (and when I am it's typically not anime anymore), but if any of my old Phantom Night/MHGO readers are still around, I thought this might make a nice Christmas gift.

Forgive me if the plot's a bit cliché and over-used. I think I tried to make it my own.

* * *

"_If you look straight up, you'll see a light that might not even exist anymore."_

I re-read that line over and over again. My great-grandfather's journals always fascinated me—when he was my age, he'd been an avid astronomer and always found a way to tie the vast mysteries of space into his journals.

When my mother died from a sudden illness this past year, my younger brother Souta and I had inherited the shrine that had been in our family for generations as well as the immense Higurashi family history. This history was contained in the shrine, in the artefacts at the shrine, in the house, and in many, many leather-bound journals that had belonged to the men and women of my family. The oldest surviving one dated back to the early seventeenth century. My grandfather had passed away two years prior to my mother from a heart attack, and because of this, I'd also inherited the legal care of my younger brother, Souta, until his graduation next year.

I wasn't able to attend formal college like I'd always planned to, so, while balancing a job as an assistant to an investments representative, I took online college courses. This, my job, and the care of the shrine and my younger brother left me almost no free time, so the fact that the well had closed was almost relieving, in a sad way.

I missed Sango, Miroku, Shippou, Inuyasha, Kouga, Kaede, and everyone else like I missed my mother and grandfather, if not more. The feudal era had become like a second home to me, my friends there like parts of myself. Sometimes, when I did the laundry, I could hear Sango laughing as we shared stories with each other. Whenever I heard a guy make an amorous remark, I expected to turn around and see Miroku there. Every time I heard a cat meow, I imagined Kirara looking quizzically my way. A child's laughter and candy stores always reminded me of Shippou. Not to mention a fleeting _'keh'_ or a sarcastic laugh on the wind that made me stop in my tracks and examine everything around me for the slightest trace of silver hair, yellow eyes or a red robe.

I had expected the final battle with Naraku to be at least somewhat disastrous, and it very nearly was, as Miroku's wind tunnel came close to swallowing his arm during his last use of it—though I didn't expect, once Naraku and his minions had been killed, to be swept forward in time to my era like the well had never existed. I even woke up at my desk, resting on my laptop like it had all been a dream. I was in shock—I actually tried jumping in the well just to test it and wound up with an arm broken in two places. That was over a year and a half ago, now. Now, I was only twenty, but I felt much, much older.

I knew it hadn't been a dream, though. I'd looked at my arm and found the very same gash from the final battle, now having turned into an ugly four-inch scab. I'd surveyed myself and found all the scars that I'd accumulated in my voyages back in time to be there. However, only I could remember that I'd ever been a part of a different era. My family had had their memories erased somehow.

My window was open and I could tell that the first fallen leaves of autumn were blowing in. One landed on my desk, and I smiled.

I re-read the final page of my great-grandfather's journal again and got stuck on the same line as before. The light that might not even exist anymore. Like a past life. _Like _my_ past life._ A tear leaked out of my eye and I let it fall.

I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I didn't hear someone scaling the walls of my house. They climbed the tree near my window and came to sit on the windowsill while I was staring at the clock, wondering for the thousandth time why things had turned out the way they had. _After all, the well has been closed for almost two years…_I mused. I sniffed lightly and looked at the time displayed in the corner of my laptop screen. It was seven in the evening; Souta wouldn't be home for another few hours.

"Gah, I _hate_ this…" I said to no one in particular, still unaware that there was someone sitting in my windowsill, willing out loud for myself to get it together. However, when my visitor, easily male by his baritone, laughed, I spun around and nearly fell out of my seat in shock.

"Hate what, Kagome?"

* * *

The initial surprise faded quickly when I realized who had joined me, looking vastly different than when I'd left him. The signature silver hair, ears, claws, and fangs were gone—yet, for some reason, his eyes had remained yellow even though he was obviously human.

Inuyasha.

I did a double take as my eyes shot open. My breath and my heart rate both shot up and I couldn't seem to form the words. In less than a second, all the questions, doubts, fears and longings I'd been cultivating for nearly two years sprang to the surface and clotted in my throat—I managed to pull one coherent thought free.

"H-how did you get here? The well is closed!" I wanted to hit myself for stating the obvious, even though I was in shock.

"What, aren't 'ya happy to see me?" He slid off the windowsill and into my room, which was formerly my mother's room and painted a warm, dark red. He closed his eyes for a moment and laughed once before answering my question. "What do you think my wish was?"

"You wished to become human?" I asked, still in utter disbelief that the man I loved and thought I'd lost forever was right in front of me, here, human, in my time. This completely went against his character—after all, I'd known all too well that Inuyasha had intended to use the jewel to become a full-blood demon.

"And I wished to live in your time."

His signature red attire was gone, but I could see he still favoured the colour. His dark red shirt hung just slightly off his frame and his jeans looked worn and had several holes in them though he couldn't have had them for very long. I noticed the outline of a large switchblade in his pocket—some things never change.

Fully aware that my mouth was hanging open like a broken hinge, I continued to think back. If Inuyasha was here, that meant he had left Miroku, Sango, and Shippou behind in the Feudal Era. If Inuyasha was human, that meant he didn't have any demonic abilities, including the use of his Tetsusaiga, any longer. He would've had to adapt to life in my era the way an immigrant adapts to a new country: learning the customs, getting a job, finding a house, etcetera. Not to mention the fact that Inuyasha had frequently complained about modern Tokyo in the past.

Somehow, this all didn't make sense.

What had happened in the eighteen months he'd been here? Where were the snarky remarks I had become so used to these past years? What was _wrong_ with the world?

"You're gonna catch flies in your mouth if you keep doing that."

Aah, there was the sarcasm. So, the apocalypse _wasn't_ coming. However, I promptly shut my mouth, only to speak again a second later.

"Inuyasha," I began, standing up and walking over to him. I grabbed his wrist and pulled him over to my bed to sit. "You have some serious explaining to do."

* * *

As much as is _possible_ in an interrogation, I did most of the talking. I didn't learn much, though: Inuyasha went right back to the way he had been in the Feudal Era the moment I started asking questions. All I learned was where he lived (nearly forty-five minutes away—Tokyo is enormous), where he worked (a doujo—it suited him), what he drove (a black Kawasaki Ninja—he had never taken to cars), and why he carried the knife (it was the closest thing to the Tetsusaiga he could carry as a human). One thing did surprise me, though—he was still wearing the rosary. Unsurprisingly, it didn't work anymore, which he demonstrated by removing the beads from his neck.

As Inuyasha recounted his story, there was one question that came up several times but never got answered, and it was ticking me off: he wouldn't tell me _why_ he'd made the wish he had. After asking him the same question for the fifth time in that hour, I fell backward onto the bed in exasperation and a bemused look crossed his features.

"All will be revealed in good time, Kagome," he said, smirking and laying a hand on my thigh. His tone of voice had changed since I'd seen him—softened, maybe. He gave a light squeeze and I swatted his hand, but the angle of the blow meant it didn't do much good. Inuyasha laughed—I sat up and swatted his arm again, from a better angle this time, to reiterate my point, a scowl with no meaning whatsoever distorting my features. His laugh increased in volume and he turned to me. "I've missed you."

My facial features relaxed again and I cocked my head, looking at Inuyasha quizzically. "Of course you have," I said in a faintly questioning tone, tucking my knees under me. Inuyasha turned more, enough that he had to swing his legs onto the bed, and practically crawled over me, his muscular form looming over mine. My heart raced and when he touched me, I inhaled sharply—when he leaned in, I fell so that I was supporting myself on my elbows. His long, dark hair fell over one shoulder as he slowly, tenderly wrapped his arms around my back and drew me to him, crushing as much of my form to him as was physically possible and leaning into the crook of my neck. He inhaled audibly.

"You still smell good, even without my demonic nose," he said. His voice was low and rough and the raw, emotional sound of it as well as the intimate contact made me gasp his name.

"Inuyasha."

He made a small sound of approval and held me closer yet, bringing one hand down to the small of my back. Even as a human, I was amazed by his strength. "Say it again," he said. I knew he meant his name. "Inuyasha," I repeated.

"I've missed hearing it from you." His words were quieter yet, almost a whisper and barely distinguishable because of the angle. The fact he was here in my presence after so long caught up with me and a few tears escaped.

"What took you so long?"

One arm still around my lower back, he released me enough that he could look at me and ran his free hand through my hair. "Tokyo is a big city, and it looks different from my bike. When I was here before, I just followed you and didn't really pay attention to where I was…I've been searching, Kagome, every chance I had. But no one knew the shrine and I kept getting lost…I gave up for a while, then yesterday, I found it by chance but no one was home, so I promised myself I'd return today, and here you were." He stroked my hair again and, when a few more tears fell, he wiped them away. After a few moments' pause, I launched myself into his arms, narrowly avoiding knocking him over with the force of it. I buried my face in his chest and had to fight back a sob.

"Inuyasha! You have no idea…I thought you were dead! I thought that maybe I'd dreamt the whole thing, because I woke up sitting at my desk and my family had no memories of you or the well or anything. I've had to live with the thought that I might be crazy for _eighteen months_ and _god_ Inuyasha I've missed you!" I clung to him like I was certain he would vanish at any moment. It took him only a second to embrace me again, and when he didn't disappear into thin air, I looked up at him. "You _cannot_ ever scare me like that again, or I'll track you down and kill you," I threatened with no seriousness whatsoever as I surrounded myself with his scent again. He still smelled like the woods even though he lived in the city—he hadn't changed at all, except that he was now a human living in modern Tokyo. He smirked at my comment, holding my head to his chest with one hand. I was reminded of how much taller than me he was. He laughed, a deep, throaty sound I hadn't heard often in the four years we spent travelling together.

I blinked and the next moment, I was flat on my back. He moved so quickly that I couldn't have hoped to stop him, had I even wanted to—but the weight of his steely frame on top of mine was comforting and gave him a more tangible presence, eliminating the fleeting feeling I had that he was about to disappear. His lips hovered centimeters above mine, his face close enough that I could make out the individual flecks of dark amber in his golden eyes, and his hair brushed my face, a silky curtain of ebony. He pushed my bangs from my forehead, allowing his fingers to brush over the skin slowly enough that he could savour the feeling; when that wasn't enough, he traced lower, over my cheekbones, jawline and down my throat. There, he lingered for a long time—his eyes closed and he lowered his head so that it rested between my shoulder and neck and I began to stroke his hair, letting him know that this was okay, that he was well within his limits. He relaxed more and practically collapsed on top of me, but he quickly repositioned us so that I was lying on top of him as he just stared at me, trying to recommit my face to memory. When my arms began to tire from propping myself up, I lowered my head to his chest and curled around him, marveling at the way we fit together like puzzle pieces. I ran a hand slowly up his abs and chest, resting it over his shoulder and paying absolutely no mind as to how strange this situation was, how he'd never have let me do this eighteen months ago.

It was a strange thing, what the absence of someone as important to me as Inuyasha could do after such a long time. Initially, when I'd been jetted forward in time after the last battle, I'd felt hollow—until today, that feeling had remained, but the unrelenting ache in my chest became easier and easier to bear as time went on. From time to time, when I'd see or hear or feel or smell something that reminded me of the feudal era, the ache would become more pronounced, but even that eventually faded. Soon enough I accepted that it was simply a part of me now and that I'd have to learn to live with it—Inuyasha's re-appearance had filled the hole so quickly that I felt a new kind of pain, the sweep-you-off-your-feet, knock-the-wind-out-of-you sort of emotional tsunami that comes when every hurt, every longing, every pain that's been locked away since the separation began suddenly returns in one fell swoop. I felt like I couldn't breathe, like my heart couldn't take this much happiness. Like my soul had just collided with its other half without warning. The sonic boom tore through my chest and suddenly, I had the strangest, most powerful desire to kiss him.

So I did just that.

I turned over so our chests were pressed together, tilted my head down and pressed my lips to his. He was caught by surprise at first but before I knew it, he'd flipped us again and was kissing me like a man who'd been starved. His right hand found its way into my hair, his left over my hip—when his grip inadvertently tightened, I felt the absence of his claws.

"Kagome," he whispered just over my lips. "I never want to stop."

He was just far enough that I could see his entire face, and something burned in his eyes that I had never seen there before. Perhaps it always been there, but in my innocence, I'd never noticed; now that I had new eyes, it was unmistakable, and when my subconscious caught up, a feeling of absolute certainty gripped my stomach with an iron fist.

His eyes bore into mine with sun-like intensity, speaking a small eternity before his mouth formed the words. He was reaching into the soul of the world. I reached in and met him there. "You have no idea how in love with you I am," he finally said.

The limits of my physical body were too much to bear. My heart exploded and I wanted to transcend it all, to melt into him as though we were literally the same. He was perfect, my everything, the only reason I still existed; I had survived the last year only from the hope that he was still out there, that he was looking for me, that he was waiting. His touch told me he had wanted this for far too long, but had never known what to say. He razed my fears with invisible words that never needed to escape his mouth. He touched me with great reverence. I rose into him like he was a god in human form.

"I love you, Inuyasha," I said.

Something burned hotter and hotter in me that I could only release by touching him. His lips met mine until I could no longer breathe—somehow, my legs had wrapped around his and my back had bowed and I grabbed the blanket like it was literally my anchor to exploding into a bliss of stars and the falling sensation that sent my stomach in loops. My chest burned. I gasped audibly for breath and he let back; I stroked his hair and his breathing evened out, mine following suit in its own languid timing. He was like butter in my hands, this man of steel, and I just as well in his. His eyes were open, as were mine, piercing me as he matched my movements, holding the back of my head in one hand and my hand that had grabbed hold of the blanket in the other.

When I felt one of my legs lock up, I bit back a wince and untangled myself from him. Inuyasha lowered me back to the bed like a father would a child, but the distance was too much for either of us, and his hands kept on my arms, my exposed collarbone, my sides he had respectfully kept covered even in heat. He wouldn't rush this, I knew that. Whatever was between us was more than the transience of clothing or emotions. In many ways, he had waited longer than I had for this. The eighteen-month eternity I had suffered suddenly seemed so much less.

And suddenly, I felt water on my cheeks again. I half expected to look up and see it was him crying, so unreal was this whole situation—but of course, it was me, and as the realisation turned into my laughing at my own silly assumptions, he ran the thumb that had been holding my head under my cheekbone, a smile I'd seen less times than I'd heard him laugh lighting his face so much he seemed to glow.

"You're like an angel," I said before thinking. He rolled his eyes a little, but the smile stayed. "Eighteen months ago, if someone would have told me you would be with me like this…"

"…I wouldn't have believed them," he finished, reading my mind. "I didn't realize how much I needed you until I thought you were gone. The thing that gave you that gash on your arm poisoned you. I sent you back because I wanted you out of reach of anything that could hurt you; I took a chance that when I killed Naraku, the poison would be neutralized."

I heard myself gasp. "So you sent yourself forward not even knowing if I was alive…?"

"I figured the chance you were alive in this time was worth the gamble if the other option was you dying in mine. You have no idea how bad that thing had you, Kagome. I only went back for Naraku when Miroku told me you were still alive." He shook his head, covering his eye with a wince as though to shield himself from the memory. "I already knew I needed you by then but just wasn't about to say it. I barely even remember thinking about it once I completed the jewel—you _had_ to live. If I'd thought about it, I don't know if I'd have acted fast enough."

I was dumbfounded. It was the best explanation he had, and I knew that—I didn't understand, but I didn't need to. Neither of us did. He was here now, and that's how it was. His weight compressed the mattress below us, his scent lingered on my clothes; his presence erased the last year and a half as though it were just a bad memory. Still, I felt my heart race. It was all I could do not to grab him and envelop him and just _cry—_yet before I knew it, he did just that, and I felt the tears run again. I was too overwhelmed.

"Inuyasha," was all I could manage. He held me tighter and kissed my forehead.

So much had changed. There was this tenderness—this would _never_ have been the Inuyasha I knew before. The time hadn't erased all the curtness. But somewhere, in the fog of not knowing whether I was actually alive, he'd come to faith that I was, and that was all that kept him going.

He stayed at the shrine for the rest of the day. It was a Saturday, my off Saturday that I wasn't working, hence why I hadn't seen him when he came yesterday. When Souta arrived home from tennis, I introduced Inuyasha as an old friend. He didn't bat an eyelash, just said he looked familiar somehow and disappeared into the kitchen to make his dinner and go to bed.

Eventually, the feeling of surreality subsided. Though we spent all of the next day together, it took several days of his making the trek across town before I realised he wasn't going to disappear. He stroked the mark on my arm where the beast had poisoned me with tenderness, the ghost of a loss that almost was behind his eyes before it evaporated when he met mine. He kissed me openly, without hesitation, without concerned for who saw. And if anyone so much as looked at me wrongly without his permission, I swear I sometimes heard him growl.

_fin_

* * *

_It was fun to find this buried in my files this morning. I was actually quite surprised so much of it was already done. I wrote it in three rather punctuated bursts, one in 2009, a long update in 2012, and the last little bit right before posting—I can nearly draw lines between the years. Forget time travel. Forgotten, unfinished stories make for excellent windows into the past._

_This is it for this one. I haven't been following the anime FFN scene for several years, now—and actually, most of the writing I do these days is academic or professional. I'm boring. Still, I hope you enjoyed this little blast from the past. I was aiming for a quasi-realism. I don't know if anyone else has experienced this, but real love can stop your heart so much that words literally fail you, so if I succeeded in portraying that, please do let me know!_

_Au revoir,_

_xx Vena _


End file.
